Welcome to LateNighter’s Spon-Con Watch. In-show advertising is as old as late night itself, but as shows face declining ratings and shrinking budgets, sponsored content (or “brand activations,” as they’re called in marketing circles) has become increasingly common and, at times, more elaborate than ever before. In this recurring feature, we keep tabs on how late-night shows are working to wed commerce with comedy.
Hearing Jimmy Kimmel tease a segment by saying, “But first, the future is truly and finally upon us,” one might think they’re in for a snarky bit. In this case, however, it was simply another brand activation.
“And Wing drone delivery is here to prove it,” the host continued on Tuesday night’s Jimmy Kimmel Live, kicking off a 75-second in-show ad featuring Kimmel’s sidekick/security guard Guillermo Rodriguez and announcer Lou Wilson.
Last week the pair appeared in a piece of spon-con for myQ, a smart-home system that came in handy during a Guillermo vacation. This week, the bit took place backstage at JKL, 20 minutes before showtime. It begins with Guillermo discovering Wilson has lost his voice—the result, the announcer explains via hand gestures, of “talking too much trash on the pickleball court.”
After Guillermo’s initial idea of subbing himself in at Wilson’s microphone is swiftly rejected, Guillermo conjures another solution. “We can use Wing drone delivery! They’ll help you get your voice back,” Guillermo says. “And they deliver a lot of stuff as fast as 15 minutes.”
Despite what the service’s name might bring to mind, it’s not just buffalo wings and the like available for delivery. But they do have a partnership with DoorDash for food delivery.
The JKL pair get teas, honey, lozenges, and throat sprays delivered straight to the show’s Los Angeles studio via drone—a task that presumably would have otherwise been relegated to a production assistant.
Guillermo even helps Wilson’s recovery by giving him a friendly foot massage. Naturally, it all works out in the end, with the announcer gaining an even boomier baritone than usual.
Owned by Google parent company Alphabet, the service competes with other early drone delivery options like Amazon Prime Air. Wing’s drone delivery is only available in the Dallas-Fort Worth area at present, though the ad promises more cities are coming in the near future.
Indeed, a check of Wing.com’s eligibility map confirms the service is not yet available at the El Capitan Entertainment Center, where Jimmy Kimmel Live tapes its shows. It seems Wing must have really pulled some strings to make sure Kimmel’s show went off without a hitch—or been a big fan of the show and its signature sidekicks.
